The described aspects relate to mobile wireless communications, and more particularly, to apparatus and methods of connection establishment in a communications network.
Mobile wireless communications involve an access terminal (AT) interacting with a communications network to originate or receive a call. A call originated by an AT is referred to as a mobile originated call, while a call received by the AT is referred to as a mobile terminated call.
In order to make or receive a call, a connection needs to be established between the AT and a communications network. In establishing such a connection, an AT context is created at the various entities involved in a path that defines the connection between the AT and the communications network. For example, the connection path may include, at least, the AT, a radio access network component, a packet data serving node (PDSN) or gateway component, and one or more core Internet Protocol (IP) network components, such as a mobility component. When a call is made, the connection path may further include another communication device, e.g. the call originator or call receiver. The type of connection between each of these entities may vary, and as such, there may be a separate, AT-specific context corresponding to each of the connections in the path. Each separate, AT-specific context may also be referred to as a per-AT context. Each AT-specific context comprises various parameters that define attributes and/or characteristics, e.g. associated with a respective protocol layer, supporting a respective one or more portions of the connection path.
Currently, when an access terminal is powered on, a connection is established and each of the connecting entities in the connection path maintains, until the AT is powered down, a per-AT context for the AT for the connection. Even when a call is not in process, the connecting entities reserve the resources for the connection. For example, in order to receive a call, e.g. a mobile terminated call, the current architecture and protocols require that the connection is setup between the AT and the communications network.
This model is justifiable when calls occur frequently, e.g. when an inter-data-arrival time is small. When calls occur infrequently, however, this kind of model involving the reserving a per-AT context and/or resource at the network is very expensive. For example, the flexible architecture and inherent mobility of cellular communication can be leveraged by deploying a number of devices, e.g., Machine-to-Machine (M2M) devices that need to infrequently give reports, e.g., meter readings, status data, etc. Even if these M2M devices infrequently power up an AT for cellular communication, it can also be economically inefficient to provision each M2M device with a unique subscription.